Blogs I Like

May 2008

May 31, 2008

There were two show business obituaries this week of men whose names were not well-known but whose contributions were enjoyed by hundreds of millions of people the world over.
Earle Hagen was 88 and composed music for more than 3000 hours of television including the theme songs for The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Mod Squad, That Girl, and, most famously, the Andy Griffith Show. If you are whistling in your head right now then you are thinking of the right song but did you know there are words to that one too?

They start like this:

"Well, now, take down your fishin' pole and meet me at the Fishin' Hole.We may not get a bite all day, but don't you rush away.

What a great place to rest your bones and mighty fine for skippin' stones,You'll feel fresh as a lemonade, a-settin' in the shade.

Whether it's hot, or whether it's cool, oh, what a spot for whistling like a fool..."

Fellow composer Alexander Courage was also 88 when he passed this week. He wrote music for Lost In Space, The Waltons, Falcon Crest, Eight Is Enough and many more. But his most famous composition was the theme from Star Trek, over which William Shatner intoned those famous words, "Space. The Final Frontier...."

That it is another iconic instrumental television theme that also has lyrics doesn't begin to tell the rest of the story. Snopes.com has the sad tale of how Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, who wrote the words below, was able to use them to rook Mr. Courage out of half of the royalties he should have received for composing the music. Click here for the full story.

May 30, 2008

Sometimes even at Tater Tot Friday World Headquarters the pictures come out blurry. It's always operator error though - never the model's fault!

Today's Bonus Bulldogs come courtesy of Britain's Daily Mail. Believe it or not, the headline accompanying this photo was Looking like Winston Churchill is no setback for these wrinkly bulldog pups. Thanks to faithful reader Christine for the heads up!

More pictures and the rest of the article here. Have a wrinkly weekend!!!

May 29, 2008

From this morning's New York Times, the headline reads Monkeys Control A Robot Arm With Their Thoughts. Uh, hello? Can anyone else see that this is the fast track to defeatin our never-ending battle for supremacy against the apes? And why exactly are we arming the enemy anyway? Here are some highlights from the article including the scientists "cover story" that some good might come out of this.

"Two monkeys with tiny sensors in their brains have learned to
control a mechanical arm with just their thoughts, using it to reach
for and grab food and even to adjust for the size and stickiness of
morsels when necessary, scientists reported on Wednesday.

The report, released online by the
journal Nature, is the most striking demonstration to date of
brain-machine interface technology. Scientists expect that technology
will eventually allow people with spinal cord injuries and other
paralyzing conditions to gain more control over their lives.

The findings suggest that brain-controlled prosthetics, while not practical, are at least technically within reach.

In
previous studies, researchers showed that humans who had been paralyzed
for years could learn to control a cursor on a computer screen with
their brain waves and that nonhuman primates could use their thoughts
to move a mechanical arm, a robotic hand or a robot on a treadmill.

The
new experiment goes a step further. In it, the monkeys’ brains seem to
have adopted the mechanical appendage as their own, refining its
movement as it interacted with real objects in real time. The monkeys
had their own arms gently restrained while they learned to use the
added one.

Experts not involved with the study said the findings
were likely to accelerate interest in human testing, especially given
the need to treat head and spinal injuries in veterans returning from
Iraq and Afghanistan."

Me now: Look, I've seen other stories recently about monkeys designing and building weapons and now this? We are barely containing the eventual ape uprising and now some stupid doctor is giving them robots they can operate with their brains? Why not just wave the white flag and give them the keys to our stuff?Clearly we're not even trying to fight back anymore.

Read the rest of the piece here and see some video of the probably Al Qaeda monkey. Here's another video describing the work too.

May 28, 2008

Were you a card carrying member of the mighty KISSArmy back in the 1970s or was that just me? Hell to the yeah, I was. I think it was the only music fan club I was ever a member of until ... uh ... Barry Manilow's in the 1990s. Oh, and the Cowsills this decade but I haven't even received a newsletter in a while so I am not sure what is happening with that.

Today's is an audience participation post. Here are my five favorite songs from those three musical artists. In the comments section today leave your 5 favorite songs of any artist you like, any era, any genre.

Oh, and don't judge! Love!

My Five Favorite Kiss Songs Ever:

5. Strutter4. Love Gun3. Hard Luck Woman2. Beth1. Detroit Rock City

My Five Favorite Barry Manilow Songs Ever:

5. Looks Like We Made It 4. Weekend In New England3. When October Goes2. This One's For You1. Tryin' To Get The Feelin' Again

My Five Favorite Cowsills Songs Ever:

5. We Can Fly4. Hair3. Indian Lake2. Love, American Style1.The Rain, The Park And Other Things

May 27, 2008

Like millions of other space enthusiasts around the globe, I was holding my breath Sunday in the tense momentsbetween when NASA's Phoenix spacecraft landed on the Martian surface and when the data it was transmitting started to arrive back to Earth.

Fewer than half of our missions to Mars have included a successful landing but the Phoenix made the 422 million mile trip (!) and perfectly touched down on the planet's northern polar cap. Once landed, it unfolded its solar arrays, camera, weather station and more for three months of scientific testing. As you can imagine, looking for remnants of water and the possibility of past, present, or future life are the craft's top duties.

I bring this up to make this observation. You don't have to look to another planet to be impressed with man's ingenuity. Look around you right now and you'll likely see a television, or a skyscraper, or a refrigerator, or any of the millions of other things that make our life more livable. All things that were conceived, designed, and assembled by human beings just like you or me, only smarter.

That I can sit here in my living room on a tiny island in Washington and make words appear on a screen with my fingers blows my mind. That I can hit a button and then you can see it in Indiana, or India for that matter, is more than I can comprehend.

I wonder sometimes if there were a catastrophic disaster that eliminated most of the world's cities and their population, how many people would we need for the manpower and know-how to be able to rebuild many of the things we'd lost? I hope I am never in a situation where I am asked how to make a watch, or a phone, or even a spoon.

May 26, 2008

It is not uncommon around my house to talk about piggies. After all, Sophie and Godzilla are both eleven this summer and for years before they were born we had Daisy and Hamsammich, so pigs have been a part of our family for a long time.

This weekend, somehow I got to thinking about the nursery rhyme This Little Piggy and it sort of confused me a little bit.

When the first little piggy "went to market" I get the feeling it is not the supermarket and he is not shopping. But if he is going to market, in a bad way...uh....as the consumee, then is that really what you wanna put in a song targeted for one to five year-olds?

The second little piggy stayed home and I am fine with that. My pigs rarely leave the property. And since there is no mention in the song of any kind of human supervision, an outing would likely be ill-advised anyway.

Okay, the third little piggy had roast beef. Unless we were wrong about the first piggy and he really did go to the grocery store and maybe bought roast beef, where did the third little piggy get it? Did he just attack and take down a cow in the barnyard? This damn song is getting violent.

The heartbreaker in the story is the fourth little piggy. He had none. No roast beef. Or maybe he is a vegetarian? It would be unusual for a porcine to be so discerning.

The fifth little piggy went "wee wee wee" all the way home. Someone knows how to party!

Here's cellphone photo of Sophie Marie from a few days ago and we'll leave you with two surprising This Little Piggy thoughts. The first publication date for the words to this nursery rhyme was back in 1728! That is two hundred and seventy years ago. Did you imagine it was that old? Secondly, and most ironically, you can't really sing This Little Piggy to a pig since they have no fingers or toes to count.

May 25, 2008

I had something else planned to write about this morning but then I saw this, from the Albuquerque, New Mexico KOB-TVwebsite:

Group wants Wi-Fi banned from public buildings

A
group in Santa Fe says the city is discriminating against them (Italics mine) because
they say that they're allergic to the wireless Internet signal (Italics mine again. Can you believe the words you are reading here?). And now
they want Wi-Fibanned from public buildings (Okay, I hear you. I'll stop now).

Arthur Firstenberg says he is highly sensitive to certain types of
electric fields, including wireless Internet and cell phones." I get chest pain and it doesn't go away right away," he said.

Firstenberg and dozens of other electro-sensitive people in Santa Fe
claim that putting up Wi-Fi in public places is a violation of the
Americans with Disabilities Act.

The city attorney is now checking to see if putting up Wi-Fi could be considered discrimination.

But City Councilor Ron Trujillo says the areas are already saturated with wireless Internet. "It's not 1692, it's 2008. Santa Fe needs to embrace this technology, it's not going away," Trujillo said. The city attorney hopes to have a legal recommendation by the end of the month.

Personal to Mr. Firstenberg: Get a dog. Or a hobby. Or something to do. Just leave the rest of us alone. Thank you.

May 24, 2008

No, the title of today's post does not refer to my sad Mariners baseball team although watching their last three series against the Padres, Tigers and now the Yankees you might think so.

It is actually the name of my new favorite TV discovery, on the Spike network. Here's what the voiceover guy says at the beginning of each episode: "The human body is remarkably resilient. Every day we fight a new war against germs, toxins, injury, illness, catastrophe and calamity. The fact that we survive at all is a miracle. Because, everyday we live, we face 1000 Ways To Die!"

Thom Beers, the brains behind the sensational Seattle based Deadliest Catch came up with this one too and the title says it all. Each episode is packed with true stories of actual bizarre deaths, including real footage sometimes (like the guy who got hit by a crashing race car that hit him at over 100 miles per hour and then stopped on top of him), along with re-enactments, animation, and interviews with medical experts to describe the details of the death.

Two of my favorites so far include the Philadelphiameatpacker who froze to death in just a few minutes after being "accidentally" locked in the meat locker, always kept at a less than comfortable -10F. The show suggested it was perhaps an intentional "mistake" by the company's owner, who was also the father of a knocked up 17 year-old daughter. What I also learned: When people freeze to death they are often found with many of their clothes removed. Constricted blood vessels dilate, producing a sensation of extreme heat, prompting them to strip down. It is a phenomenon called "paradoxical undressing." Freezing to death is Way To Die #293.

I also very much enjoyed learning about the opposite way to go, six minutes at more than +200F. We saw a re-enactment of a young man at a Los Angeles hospital who, in the course of repairing an industrial dryer, found himself locked inside it as he shaked and baked to death. Ouch. What I also learned: Each year as many as twenty others meet death by dryer, or as the show so proudly put it, "in a machine set on tumble die!" Tumble Die is Way To Die#640.

Some of the tragic tales cover the same material as the well-known Darwin Awards, which i guess I could enjoy if I hadn't been fighting a years long battle to get people to stop sending me that stupid email about them over and over again.

May 23, 2008

Tater Tot Friday Bonus Bulldog:
Awesome: Not since the glory days of the Captain & Tennille do I remember seeing a bulldog on the cover of People magazine. But here's the front of this week's issue.

Not Awesome: It's bad enough that poor Hemingway had to wear some sort of Elizabethan costume at the wedding but unless he escapes, and believe me, he wants to, then he will be forced to live with Pete and Ashlee Freakin' Simpson Wentz for the rest of his sad, sad life.

Hope your weekend is phenomenal and includes no weddings and no Fallout Boy!

P.S. Smackdown Update: Today's report finds me bloodied but not beaten. I went to the address I had mailed the package to yesterday and had a nice chat with the security guard in the lobby. Here's are the new pieces of the puzzle I learned. That building has no management office. There was no suite number on the envelope I sent and no similarly named company in that building.

Sooooooooooo, what did the mail carrier do with the undeliverable package as he stood there in the lobby and realized there was no place to take it? If he took it back to the post office then why didn't he stamp it Return To Sender? The mystery deepens. I am going there next.

May 22, 2008

Listen up when I tell you that hell hath no fury like a postal customer spurned. You guys know how much I love the USPS. I use it almost every day and I depend on it to get my business done. I promote the Post Office like Tom pimps L-Ron so I'm more than a little bummed when my mail does not get from Point A to Point B.

This one is almost certainly not Postmaster John "Sweet Jack" Potter's fault but I am launching a full investigation tomorrow and will let the chips fall where they may.

Here's the deal. About three weeks ago I had lunch with a colleague of mine, a guy who works in the same business as I do, but whom I had never met. We had been email pals but one day decided to meet up at the newly renovated downtown 13 Coins restaurant, which, getting completely off-topic now, looks exactly the same to me as before it closed for the upgrade.

Lunch was terrific, stories were told, french fries were eaten, and hands were shook. About a week later, I thought of a book that related nicely to a conversation we'd had at the lunch, on a subject relevant to our work, and decided to send a copy to my friend as a thank you for meeting with me.

Here's where I struggle. My quick Google search for his company's mailing address apparently delivered an outdated result and I fell for it. So I ended up sending the package to the address his company had moved out of two years ago. Again, it was my error and I acknowledge that.

About a a week after when the gift should have arrived I figured out what had happened. But then started wondering about the people on the other side of this transaction, the ones who now work in the building I sent the thing to?

Several outcomes were possible once the misaddressed package arrived downtown. The best possible result would have been if they had seen who I was trying to mail to (It's a recognizable, well-known brand in Seattle) and took the time to pay it forward. The minimum I think I might reasonably expect in the business world is that they would simply scrawl Return To Sender on the envelope and it would be sent back to my home address on the return label so I could try again.

What I can't abide by is that the dirty commie bastards just kept it! Besides being a federal offense to intentionally open misdelivered mail it would just be a scummy thing to do.

Here's where the smackdown I telegraphed at the top of this post comes in. I am driving down to the wrong address today and bringing a little Colombo* action. I've got just a few questions and don't mind asking them. Once I've established that another tenant is in that office, which i absolutely expect to be the case since it is a high rent office building in the heart of the city, I will start piecing together the chain of command of the package. I will let you know what happens tomorrow.

"Don't mess with the bull. You'll get the horns," said a once-famous now-dead guy. Not Peter Falk though. He's still alive.

May 21, 2008

The Mystery Daughter and I were in an airport preparing to fly back from an out-of-town trip this past weekend when a curious thing happened. It's likely it's happened to you too if you fly with any regularity.

We were approached by a middle-aged woman (if she lives to be 120) who asked us if we would "watch her things" while she "ran to the restroom." The way she phrased it made it a rhetorical question in her mind. She barely waited for an answer before she trotted away.

Melissa and I both noticed her demeanor and wondered if there is some sort of official airport etiquette that applies to this situation. Were we allowed to say no? And by saying yes what were our responsibilities until the baggage's owner returned?

If someone else swooped in during those few minutes and started to pick up the bags, what were we required to say? Just "Dude!" or Stop it?" Or is an "Oh, no you didn't!" called for? Would we be expected to notify airport police? Homeland Security? Or tackle the potential thieves ourselves?

And if the luggage was stolen, would we be liable financially? Legally? Might we have to miss our flight to give a statement?

Should we have even thought of any of this or just rolled with the flow, assuming there would be no drama and it would play out uneventfully just as it did? Would it have been acceptable to decline the request? What do you think?

New Business: Typepad made writing this post quite difficult by springing a bunch of new "improved" Rich Text features on me last night. They were slow to load and awkward to use. I hope it posts okay.

Also, I spoke with my Blogfather Frank Murphy this weekend and he advised me to decrease the number of entries that load on the front page of StronglyWorded Letter.com. I had set it up that way as a convenience to occasional visitors so they didn't have to scroll back through the archives to catch up but he pointed out that too many posts sometimes makes the site slow to load and no one likes that. So I decreased the number of posts that appear up front to just fourteen. Of course, all content is still available in the archives. Let's see how everybody likes that.

May 20, 2008

This post isn't exactly about politics although it does start with Senator Barack Obama, the likely nominee for the Democratic Party in 2008.

This past weekend the candidate gave a stump speech, this time in Portland, Oregon and it is totally a coincidence that this is the second day in a row I've written about the Beaver State.

What was noteworthy about this appearance was the astonishing size of the crowd. The Portland Fire Bureau estimated that 75,000 people turned up to see a politician speak.

Oregon is, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, more than ninety percent white. Interestingly, that is 40% more white than Mr. Obama is.

Like I said, this is not about politics. Forget who you are thinking of voting for or why. Let's talk about audience appeal, magnetism, charisma, or whatever word you want to describe that could make 75,000 people spend a Sunday listening to a speech. Even for free. Even on a nice day on the banks of the beautiful Willamette River.

How many others can you think of? No way President Bush draws that. Or even Miley Cyrus. I'll suggest Pope Benedict might hit that number. But who else? Can you think of anyone else with that kind of pull to add to my two-person list?

May 19, 2008

One of the great mysteries of the United States, at least to me, is why you can't pump your own gasoline in Oregon. That's right, when you drive south from my house and cross the bridge from Vancouver, Washington into Portland, Oregon then all of a sudden you are in 1958 when you pull into a service station. I half expect to see girls on roller skates serving milkshakes while I watch the guy fill my tank. Come to think of it, that is not the worse idea ever.

I don't know when the great state of Oregon will put all those attendants out of work and repeal that law but I do know it is the end of an era on Prince Edward Island in eastern Canada this month.

Yes, for the first time since 1973 you can now buy a can of beer in that province. And soft drinks in a can for the first time since 1984.

Prince Edward Island was way ahead of the coming environmental awareness movement when they banned aluminum cans all those decades ago in favor of only refillable glass bottles. Here's why, so says former premier Pat Binns, "A pop bottle is refilled on average 17 times. You can imagine the energy that saves compared to filling a can in Montreal, driving it all the way to P.E.I., putting it through recycling and back into the mainstream again. Environmentally, glass is much better product than a can that has been used once."

The Niagra Falls Review in Ontario, Canada, where I read the story, also points out that "silica, the raw ingredient
in glass, is one of the most plentiful and readily available substances
on Earth. Aluminum, on the other hand, is a very expensive metal
extracted from bauxite at enormous environmental cost."

May 18, 2008

(Click to enlarge) I don't know this guy and can certainly not recommend him for dating but one of my readers, Dana, does. And I do give him credit for being pro-active in this sometimes difficult dating world. Here is more about his plan from this unnamed dude's MySpace page:

"About me:Why I am doing this? I've tried the 'tried-and-true-ways' to meet someone and figured I'd network and offer a financial incentive for people to refer their female friends to me.

How does this work? Well, just mail me a note about your friend/relative with a link to their picture (or their myspace page) and I'll do the rest. Or you can invite me to have coffee (preferably in L.A., although I will be in SF May 10-12) with the two of you. If I date your friend for at least 6 months, the $600 is yours.Wanna contact me directly and date me yourself? After 6 months, the $600 GOES TO A CHARITY OF YOUR CHOICE.Why $600? The IRS is giving out $600 Economic Stimulus Payments -- I'm rolling mine into a Romantic Stimulus Payment.

Who I'd like to meet:Female (20’s- 40’s), any height, any religion, non-smoker, LA or SF area resident (or willing to visit often/consider relocating), indoorsy (i.e. museums as opposed to mountains), warm, affectionate, an Abby to my Ira (hey, I just rented it). Someone who likes guys like me."

What do you think, ladies? Interested? Is this ballsy or desperate? Will it work?

May 17, 2008

As you know, The California Supreme Court dropped a gay atomic bomb on Thursday when they overturned the ban on same-sex marriages in that state. But that is not what this post is about, no matter how much I enjoy seeing Portia Di Rossi kiss a girl even if it is just EllenDeGeneres.

I've caught some of the coverage on the cable news channels and particularly on talk radio and have had just about an assful over two things I keep hearing said over and over again.

Thing 1. "We've got to stop these activist judges."

Okay, someone help me here. President Bush was the first person I ever heard use this term and it has caught on like Free Hot Wings ever since. If a judge or court makes a ruling one disagrees with, then they are characterized as "activist judges." But if one agrees with the ruling then the judge or court was "accurately interpreting the law." Because.....everyone who makes those statements is also a constitutional scholar so they would know?

That doesn't give the judicial branch, generally the most learned of any part of our government, much credit, does it? In this particular ruling, for instance, the California Supreme Court, where six of the seven were justices were Republican appointees, voted 4-3 to overturn the earlier Appeals court ruling.

You can read the opinions of all seven and they all justify their individual conclusions based on their interpretations of the Constitution, not based on their personal views on this one issue. They used the same criteria earlier courts used to make discrimination against citizens based on gender and race illegal in this country. I am not saying there aren't any bad judges or judges who sometimes make legal mistakes but that is why we have a higher court in place to have a way to settle any questions. This system worked exactly the way it was designed, regardless of the outcome.

Thing 2: "This ruling lets four wackos hijack the will of the people."

First of all, we've done pretty well in this country with a "majority rules" form of government for a very long time. 51-49 still makes a law in the Senate, and 500,000 to 499,999 still gets you elected as Mayor of any number of good-sized cities in this country. 4-3 means 4 wins.

Secondly, and this one irks me the mostest. It is not the job of the California Supreme Court or any other judge to rule according to the will of the people. No, their job is to rule according to the law. The people can legislate their will as much as they want as long as their wishes do not violate the Constitution. There are lots of laws that I disagree with and many rulings that make me furious. But that doesn't mean judges should care what I think. That is not their job.

May 16, 2008

Well, it's been a long week for the Tot and she has earned a nap to get ready for the weekend. It is supposed to hit ninety degrees here tomorrow which is very uncomfortable for bulldogs and piggies so there is going to be some playing in the hose happening at my house (not a euphemism).

Tater Tot Friday Bonus Bulldog:

Congratulations to Paul and Shelly on the new member of their family. Say hello to little Guinness and make it a great weekend...

May 15, 2008

If you thought yesterday's post about a guy selling chainsaws one day and singing on tour with Boston was hard to believe, your head is going to explode today.

Here is a 1995 painting entitled Benefits Supervisor Sleeping by an artist named Lucian Freud. If you are a modern art aficionado then perhaps you are familiar with his work. I was not until yesterday.

That was when StronglyWordedLetter.com reader Rob sent me the story of Mr. Freud's painting being sold at Christie's auction house in New York. Before I tell you for how much, gaze again at the beauty above (of then-38-year-old Sue Tilley who was, yes, a benefits supervisor) and fix a number in your mind that you would consider a fair price for the work.

The painting actually set a record for the highest price ever paid for a work by a living artist. It went for $33.64 million dollars. **

As an investment it sure seems like a risky bet to me but then no one liked Andy Warhol's celebrity silkscreens back when he made them and one of them from 1966, seen here, just sold at this same auction for $32.5 million.

* I apologize to the 85% of you who saw the heading of today's post and had higher hopes. I know that particular nudity was not what you were breathlessly anticipating.

May 14, 2008

This truly is one of the most remarkable rock and roll fantasy stories I have ever heard. Helpful back story for my younger readers (Hi Melissa!): The band Boston had the best selling debut album of all time in 1976. That one sold 17 million copies (!) and they followed it up with several other multi-platinum efforts and hit songs like More Than A Feeling, Don't Look Back, and their #1 charting ballad, Amanda.

Now, highlights from the recent USA Today article:

"One day you're trying to get Home Depot shoppers to apply for in-store credit. The next you're rehearsing with Boston and getting ready for a national summer tour.

'I never could have dreamed this,' says Tommy DeCarlo, 43, Boston's new frontman, who is taking leave from his credit manager job at a Charlotte Home Depot to perform with the band. "That first gig is going to be something."

Bands ranging from AC/DC to Lynyrd Skynyrd have found new singers in the wake of tragedy (Delp committed suicide last year), inevitably choosing road-tested replacements. DeCarlo's rocking Cinderella tale includes the fact that he never has even been in a band.

'I did sing After the Lovin' at my grandparents' 50th wedding anniversary,' says the affable DeCarlo, who is married and has two teenagers. 'I think they enjoyed it.'

All Boston founder Tom Scholz knows is he can't believe his ears. 'During rehearsals, it can get downright eerie,' he says. 'I forget it's not Brad. It makes me feel like someone was at work up there.'

In tribute to Delp, DeCarlo posted MP3 files of himself singing Boston over a karaoke soundtrack on his MySpace page. (He had hocked his prized keyboard in 2006 to buy his kids' Christmas gifts.) An impressed visitor to his page urged him to contact Boston management and offered up an old e-mail address. Doubtful but with nothing to lose, DeCarlo sent off a note with a link. Destiny intervened.

'My wife was at her computer playing our tunes, and I asked her whether it was us playing live,' Scholz says. 'She said, 'It's some guy in North Carolina singing your songs.' I said, 'I know Brad's voice, and that's Brad.' She turned it up, and only when I heard the backing track did I know it wasn't us.'

Scholz flew DeCarlo and his family up for an audition, which led to a Delp tribute show and the tour invite. DeCarlo and the band's other new member, Stryper frontman Michael Sweet, will appear on Boston's next album in early 2009.

Me again: Isn't that an incredible story? The fact that he was never even in a band before Boston makes it so much more bizarre than the real life story of the Judas Priest cover band singer who took over the real thing. That tale was turned into the Rock Star movie, starring Mark Wahlberg.

Tommy Decarlo's Boston plays Seattle July 10th (with Styx!). I am tempted to go and see Mr. Home Depot for myself.

May 13, 2008

Yesterday my brother sent me this photo of a flooded intersection about five miles from where he works in Maryland (that's one of those states you might not have heard of but but trust me, it's real). On a normal week this would make the national news but right now it might not make the top ten weather emergencies in progress.

Seriously, what's the deal? Flooding yesterday in a South African town left more than a thousand families homeless.

There have been more than 100 tornadoes in the Midwest in the last two weeks, killing about two dozen.

The last week of April saw thousands of acres of Southern California blackened by wildfires. This week the same is happening in central Florida.

This month's cyclone in Burma may have claimed 100,000 lives.

Yesterday's 7.9 earthquake in southwest China, the worst in more than thirty years, caused at least 15,000 deaths and counting.

There have been several shark attacks, some fatal, all in the last two weeks at beaches as far flung as Mexico, California, Florida and Australia.

That kid David Archeletta made it to the top three on this season's American Idol.

See what I mean? Disaster after disaster. Is it just me or does it seem like somehow they can't all be coincidentally happening at about the same time? Like they are related in some way I can't see? The Earth is fighting back or something? Anyone? Beuller? Beuller? Al Gore? Anyone?

May 12, 2008

There were a large number of Democrats who would have liked to have seen you get the party's nomination when you ran for president in 2004, who felt that you got a raw deal being derailed by The Scream, and that you would have had a much better chance of preventing George Bush's second term than old WhatsHisName who ran and failed.

You've lost whatever goodwill you had with this voter though with the way you're guiding the DNC through the 2008 campaign. Your current television commercial grossly distorting Senator McCain's comments about American involvement in Iraq for 100 years is something you should be very ashamed of, not just as the party leader but as a U.S. citizen.

I know you've seen the unedited remarks from the town hall meeting in New Hampshire where Mr. McCain answered that question about President Bush's belief that U.S. troops might be in Iraq for 50 years. He made it very clear that whether is 50 or 100 years it would be fine with him "as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed." To further clarify his meaning he reminded the audience that we have been in Japan for more than 60 years and South Korea for more than 50. He was obviously talking about peacekeeping, not combat deployment.

The only people who could draw the conclusion your television ad does, that Senator McCain's intention is 100 more years of the kind of involvement we have had in Iraq the last five, are either stupid, dishonest, or both.

What's most troubling for me is that you have two candidates vying for the Democratic presidential nomination whose positions both differ vastly from Senator McCain's on how to proceed in this war. Why not spend that advertising money to talk about what their plans are instead of making up policies for your opponent?

Political ads like this one are not only unethical, they denigrate our democratic process. They are also insulting to the American people. If you can't see that then you prove yourself to be unfit to lead the party, much less a nation.

May 11, 2008

"I believe I have made reference to the 1905 waterfront home that Donna and I are beginning to remodel here on the island. During the past two weeks our team has gutted it on the inside; removing all of appliances, most of the utilities and nearly all the interior walls too.

It was inside one of those walls that we found a partial Seattle Daily Times newspaper dated 14 November, 1926...

As excited as I was to read what President Coolidge was up to that week, the only two sections we found were the Automotive and Society pages. "

Today, I bring you the second part of our tour through that day's paper.

Here's an ad for the Hartford Glass Co., at 910 Pike Street:

"Show us your Open Car. We'll Show you a Genuine Rex Enclosure at Amazingly Low Cost.

Don't put up with the discomforts of side curtains any longer! Drive in and let us show you a genuine Rex Enclosure that will give you all the smug comfort and warmth of a closed car at amazingly low cost.

No Delay. Installed In A Few Hours."

"Teeth Like Pearls, by Edna Wallace Hopper

My teeth, as countless women know, glisten like a row of pearls.

This tells you why. I use a new type tooth paste which combines all helps in one. The ablest authorities I consult told me to employ it.

The name is Quindent, meaning five in one. It is made by Quindent Laboratories. It contains an olive oil cleanser of the highest order. Two harmless polishers which beautify the teeth. Four antiseptics and iodine, to combat germ attacks on the gums. Magnesia and other antacids, to neutralize the acids which cause tooth decay. And breath deodorants...."

(Can you imagine an ad today that would say, "The ablest authorities I consult told me to employ it"?

Here's the 1926 college football schedule, brought to you by General Moto-Crat Gasoline: (Click on this, or any photo, to enlarge)

"Football Huskies Ready For Action

There's plenty of power and getaway in this bunch of boys and they tie in very well with the big General Moto-Crat Gasoline sign which is directly in back of them. Yes, it's the University of Washington Huskies..."

(Travel times in the 1920s probably explain why there were no California or Arizona teams in the conference yet. Just nearby Idaho, Oregon and Montana.)

Ready to travel? Here's an ad from the Tacoma office of the Canadian Pacific Cruise Line. Remember, the stock market crash of 1929 that ushered in the Great Depression was still nearly three years away so many Americans were feeling flush.

"Visit the world's out-of-the-way places; see the places of history that have always appealed to you - the Sphinx, the Pyramids, Bethlehem, the Holy Land! All this on the Canadian Pacific Mediterranean Cruise - 64-day journey to fifteen nations; seventeen ports of calls with 34 days ashore. Finest accommodations, services and management - afloat and ashore. Book now.

Sailing from New York City on February 12, 1927, on the Empress of France..."

Here's my favorite ad in the paper, not for any particular shop but just to promote sending Christmas cards, a tradition that sadly seems to be dying out in 21st century America.

"Aren't they bewildering? Christmas cards, I mean! They are so crisp and their message so very 'Pollyanna' that one needs a particularly cheery frame of mind to select them properly.

I saw a card with only a robin red-breast perched on its gray background, but his beak was so wide open as he tweet-tweeted his Christmas anthem so wholeheartedly, or rather whole-throatedly, that he was quite irresistible.

Then the inevitable snow scene and prancing horses that make one think they smell turkey cooking, and green cedar boughs.

Cards whose messages give one a catch in the throat with their verses starting - "Do you remember when" - and cards so formal and elegant with their gorgeously lined envelopes and the messages couched in carefully chosen phrases. Each has individual charm."

More to come at a later date and check this out. Since my first post on the newspaper bounty, we found another one, this time below the kitchen floor. It is the Seattle Daily Times sports section dated October 9, 1927, the day after the New York Yankees won the World Series. Beautiful photos of Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and the rest of what many consider to the the best single team to ever take the field. What do you think? Ebay?

May 10, 2008

My pal Marty and I went into Jack-in-The-Box the other day to pick up some lunch. We were going to just use the drive through lane but since I wanted sauce for my chicken strips, and we know I am zero for all in that happening at the pickup window, we decided we'd best go in instead.

It was during the busy lunchtime rush so we found ourselves standing for several minutes near the counter waiting for our food to be ready. It wasn't long before one of us commented on the beep beep beep coming from the kitchen. Beep beep beep. Over and over again. Beep beep beep.

I don't know from what device the beep was emanating but either the signal was being ignored or as soon as one machine was turned off and reset another must have started up. Beep beep beep. Minute after long painful minute. It really couldn't have been more annoying.

I got to thinking about all the other beeps I have noticed lately. At the gas station the pump beeps when you insert your credit card, beeps when it is time to select a nozzle, beeps when you are through pumping.

I had a rental car last week while traveling for work. It beeped if you started the car before your seat belt was on, even in park. it beeped if you turned the car off but didn't remove the key. Kill me.

We have a cool bonus refrigerator drawer built into our kitchen island. When the regular fridge is full it is awesome to use the little one to store sodas or bulky items. Trouble is, as soon as you open it and for the duration it is open, beep beep beep.

When did the world decide that there wasn't enough noise in our lives? And who chose that loud, shrill, piercing tone as the standard? There must be a hundred softer, more pleasant sounds that could have been used instead. In many cases, a flashing light would be preferable instead of the noisy beep.

May 09, 2008

Enjoying another week of being Queen of the World, here's Tater Tot's latest day at the beach.

Tater Tot Friday Bonus Bulldog:

Thanks to blog reader John for sending me a link to the recent Asian International Dog Show. I don't have any information on this beauty but she seems to be getting her nails done for the competition here.

May 08, 2008

I was just lucky that day back in December of 2006 when I stopped by to visit my friend Randy who works as one of Seattle's best picture framers. He was getting set to work on a painting by a friend of his and I just fell in love with it on first look. "Is there any way it is for sale?" I asked. "I'll call my friend and see," he told me.

After a brief phone call, Randy relayed some good news and some bad news. Yes, his friend would be willing to sell it to me but I should know it would not be available for some time as it was being prepped for shipping to Washington D.C. where it would hang in the Smithsonian Institution's National Portrait Gallery.

Randy's friend was well-known painter Mexican artist Alfredo Arreguin and the work I saw that day was his 1998 portrait of fellow painters Frida Kahlo and her husband, Diego Rivera. Here is the jpeg Alfredo sent me after my check cleared. :) Until yesterday it was all I had to remember the piece by.

Frida Y Diego hung in the National Portrait Gallery from May 2007 until February of this year and last month finally made its way back home to Seattle where Mr. Arreguin lives with his lovely wife Susie, also a very accomplished artist. I had the pleasure of visiting their home yesterday to pick up the painting and hear a little of their 35 year love story.

Like everyone, I enjoy beautiful things around me, but I will treasure my new acquisition even more having stood with the artist on the spot where it was created. In case you are wondering, as I was, it took Alfredo just nine weeks to paint it, despite the painstakingly detailed mosaic and the very large canvas. I waited a year and a half to get it home and hung and here's what it looks like above the doorway to my living room.....

For my Western Washington readers, the Linda Hodges Gallery on First Avenue in Seattle is showing some of Alfredo's work through the month of May. Click here to see some images.

May 07, 2008

Do you recognize the woman on the left in this recent news photograph? That's Deborah Jeane Palfrey, recently convicted of running a Washington call-girl ring. You may have heard her referred to by her media nickname, the D.C. Madam.

The woman on the right in the picture is Deborah's mom. She was in the news last week too when she found her daughter's body swinging from a nylon rope in her Florida home. It is unusual that suicide notes are released to the public, but she left three.

The first was for whoever found her body:

The second (on the other side of the above Do Not Revive note) was to her mother:

And the third was to her sister Bobbie (Click on each to enlarge):

If you've got both the time and the interest, do yourself a Google search on "Palfrey murder" and see how the blogosphere has exploded with theories as to why, despite the medical examiner's certainly, this was not a suicide but a murder. Some even suggest the notes are forged, citing "evidence" like this:

Why would her note say,"I cannot live the next 6-8 years behind bars for what both
you and I have come to regard as this 'modern day lynching,' only to
come out of prison in my late 50s a broken, penniless and very much
alone woman." They point out that most legal analysts expected her prison sentence, scheduled to be handed down July 24, to be more in the two-to-three year range and that she also stood to make millions to write a book in which she named the names of her famous D.C. clients.

Unrelated Editor's Note: One of you will post the 3,000th reader comment on this blog today since going live seven months ago. Thanks to you and everyone else who chooses to make this daily visit interactive.

May 06, 2008

I'm not what you would call the target shopper for the QVC television shopping network. A) I'm a man and B) I'm way under their average audience age of 54. I've bought maybe two things from them ever and do not make that channel a destination on my DirectTV.

Having said all that I was still fascinated by the newspaper profile on QVC this week in USA Today. Did you know the channel was founded in 1986 by Joseph Segel, who also founded the Franklin Mint, a direct seller of collectibles, in 1964?

May 05, 2008

After a bummer post about a dead guy on Saturday and a bummer post about a dead horse on Sunday it is time to definitely lighten up on today's blog.

According to Forbes, a Mr. Mukesh Ambani is the richest citizen of India and is building what could be the world's largest and costliest home with a price tag nearing two billion dollars. Two. Billion. Dollars. For a house.

When the Ambani residence is finished in January, completing a four-year process, it will be 550 feet high with 4,000,000 square feet of interior space. Say it with me: Four million square feet. It will be a 60 story skyscraper, but with "just" 27 stories of livable space, in downtown Mumbai.

While a hotel or condominium has a common layout, replicated on every floor, and uses the same materials throughout the building, the Ambanis' home has no two alike in either plans or materials used.

Atop six stories of parking lots, the living quarters begin at a lobby with nine elevators, as well as several storage rooms and lounges. Down dual stairways with silver-covered railings is a large ballroom with 80 per cent of its ceiling covered in crystal chandeliers.There's also a four-story vertical garden and three rooftop helicopter pads. For when your dinner guests all arrive at once, I guess.

May 04, 2008

Here's part of the Baltimore Sun's recap of yesterday's disastrous Kentucky Derby running at Churchill Downs.

LOUISVILLE,
Ky. - "Eight Belles was grabbing all the real estate she could as she
pounded down the front stretch in a long-striding effort to catch Big
Brown as he streaked toward victory.

It was a race Big Brown would win by 4 3/4 lengths, but Eight Belles
had shown her stamina and determination and the 157,770 fans at Churchill Downs for the 134th Kentucky Derby celebrated as the favorite, followed by the lone filly in the race, came home one-two today.

But the celebration didn't last. As Eight Belles galloped out around
the first turn, she stopped and went to her knees and then collapsed on
the track.

Eight Belles, a big, strapping daughter of Unbridled's Song who was
attempting to become the fourth filly to win the Derby, had broken both
of her front ankles.

She was immediately euthanized.

'There was no reason to wait,' said Dr. Larry Bramlage, the American Association vet on call.

In the stands trainer Larry Jones saw his filly cross the finish line
with her ears up, in no distress and he left the stands elated, having
seen Eight Belles join Hard Spun as a second-place finisher for him in
back-to-back Derbies. It wasn't until he got to the track that he
discovered a horse had gone down and then that it was Eight Belles.

'I was shocked,' said Jones. 'Put her down? We're used to trying to
save them now. But when I did see her, there was no doubt it had to be
done.'

Bramlage, who has been working at race tracks since 1975, said he had never seen such an injury.

'Sometimes, rarely, you might see a horse suffer something in one leg,'
Bramlage said. 'But I've never seen it happen in both like that.'

Eight Belles is the second 3-year-old in three years to be euthanized
after injuries in a Triple Crown Race. Barbaro, the 2006 Derby winner,
suffered a shattered left front leg in the Preakness Stakes two weeks
after winning here."

Bean here. Question: At what price entertainment, you guys? I know that horse racing in this country generates millions of dollars of revenue for those involved and is enjoyed by millions of fans as well.

But are the animals that are born and bred just to race merely expendable cogs in the money-making machinery? Should we just expect they'll just lose a fewas the price of doing business? At the end of the day is Eight Belles' death just like crashing a NASCAR vehicle? Is it, "No sweat, we'll buy another one?"

Here's all I know. At 3:15 yesterday afternoon this very young horse was completely healthy. And through no fault of her own, just ten minutes later, she was completely dead.

May 03, 2008

That was the headline on anews wire service story in the print edition of yesterday's Seattle Post- Intelligencer. It is not the kind of headline that would guarantee I would keep reading but I am glad I took the time. Please join me and you'll see why.

"Denied transplant over pot use: A musician who was denied a liver transplant because he used medical marijuana with medical approval under Washington state law to ease the symptoms of advance hepatitis C died Thursday.

The death of Timothy Garon, 56, at Bailey-Boushay House, an intensive-care nursing center, was confirmed to the Associated Press by his lawyer and a spokeswoman for Virginia Mason Medical Center, which operates Bailey-Boushay.

Garon died a week after his doctor told him a University of Washington Medical Center committee had again denied him a spot on the liver transplant list because of his use of marijuana."

Okay, everybody still with me? The way that deal works, and this is the case in many other states as well, is that you are automaticallydenied a place on the organ transplant list if you have taken any non-prescription drugs in the past six months. Or taken the one prescription drug that your doctor gives you that is singled out above all others by the U.S. Government as being more dangerous than the rest.

Oh, but you are welcome to re-apply if you are "clean" for six months though, if you are still alive.

When I am running things (I'll get back to you with a date) there will be this new law on the books in my state:

No level of government gets to decide what a doctor can and can not prescribe to his patients.

May 02, 2008

"You've got two choices, Daddy. Reach for the ball and I will grab it with my teeth and not let go so you can not throw it, roll it, bounce it, or in any way make the next move in our game. Or, you can not reach for the ball and I will bark and bark and bark at you."

Tater Tot Friday Bonus Bovine:

It seems inconceivable so soon after losing our beloved steer, Hey, back on March 2nd that we could have another cow in jeopardy so soon. This is Betsy, a rescue heifer who was already around age twenty when we adopted her from a no-win situation four years ago. It took a very long time for her to warm up to us as she had not been raised around people at all and now we are in the difficult position of trying to get her to trust us as we try to nurse her back to health.

While she is recovering from pneumonia it is so hard for her to understand the times she has to stay in the barn when everyone else is outside grazing in the sunshine. She doesn't like having her temperature taken and she really doesn't like any of the shots. She's had Vitamin B to get her stomachs moving, steroids to get her appetite up, and antibiotics to treat the infection.

She is getting better though and we'll keep on doing whatever we can for her. She deserves as many happy years as she can get. Otherwise, she may never know how this story ends that Donna is reading to her as they keep each other company in Betsy's stall!

May 01, 2008

I had a doctor's appointment the other day and got into a conversation with the receptionist about how rough Mondays are for most people, coming back to work and whatnot. That got us talking about how great three day weekends are and how there should be more of them.

Why not every weekend? Isn't it time to seriously look at the idea of the four-day-a-week, ten-hour-day work week for some people? And not just for the mental health benefits.

By coincidence, I just saw this story:

"It's a way to save gas by commuting to work one day less. West Virginia workers are thinking about going to the shorter work week which, obviously, would cut fuel consumption by 20 percent. This is not a new idea. It was first broached in 1973 during the first oil crisis --you know, long lines, odd and even days, back when gas wasn't even a dollar a gallon. The idea never caught on but today, several cities in California, Nevada and Arizona are already experimenting with a 4-day work week."

Seeing where the current energy crisis is going and with talk of 200 dollar a barrel oil in our future, isn't it time to take a new look at mixing up the work week? Why do most people need to work their eight hours Monday through Friday anyway? Not just four ten-hour days should be examined for many workers but how about shifting some jobs, or industries, to Wednesday through Sunday? And aren't there many businesses -say, making baseball bats- where the factory could operate 6pm to 2am instead of "regular" business hours? Nine to five is starting to look sooooo 20th Century.